WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) -- Local and state leaders met for breakfast this morning and to discuss business of education.

The New Hanover County School Board held a breakfast meeting to inform leaders about the importance of considering education as a top priority, especially when it comes to planning the 2012 budget.

"We have to identify that there is low morale. That teachers need to be lifted up. That funding needs to be increased for schools, not cut, in order for us to do the best things for our students because that's what every teacher wants to do. Why else would you go into the profession?," New Hanover County Teacher of the Year Rachael Moser said.

Moser says she thinks it's important that leaders know the importance of starting from the ground up to make improvements to the community as a whole.

"We either invest in the children now and we give money to the school system and to the teachers so that they can provide that quality education, or we see those things that we don't want to see go up, go up. We see crime go up. We see an achievement gap go up. We pay now or pay later," Moser said.

State and local leaders say money is tight, but they are doing everything they can to stretch funding. State Sen. Thom Goolsby (R-9th District) says if we can fix education, other problems may also be solved.

"Education is where it all starts," Sen. Goolsby said. "Nobody's going to move companies to North Carolina, create jobs, do what needs to be done if we don't have a workforce that can think. That can work. That can produce."

Leaders agree that the most important thing schools across the state can do is speak up and tell them exactly what they need.

"I think it's very important, especially with the upcoming budget talks that are going to begin shortly, that the commissioners have a full grasp of where the schools are now, what the schools want, and what the school's needs are," New Hanover County Commissioner Chair Ted Davis said.

The state legislature will begin discussing the 2012 budget in May.

New Hanover County officials hope the breakfast was informative for the leaders when it comes to making decisions.

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"We either invest in the children now and we give money to the school system and to the teachers so that they can provide that quality education, or we see those things that we don't want to see go up, go up. We see crime go up. We see an achievement gap go up. We pay now or pay later," Moser said.

Well, where is the quality education. We've been pouring money into the school system for decades, including the "education lottery" and people don't see any improvement.

"New Hanover County officials hope the breakfast was informative for the leaders when it comes to making decisions."

Hopefully leaders will think of the "taxpayers" and start demanding results and teacher pay raises tied to the achievement of students performance before blindly throwing more money around. When we see quality, then let the money flow.

In any other profession, proficiency and results dictate raises and promotions.

Goolsby et al are only paying lip service. In another report Goolsby's quoted as "not hearing from teachers" which is a lie. As a resident of New Hanover and an educator myself, I've contacted his office on more than one occasion voicing my concerns over the action of the legislature, with no response. Every record I've seen on his efforts in the NC legislature shows anything but supporting educators. He stands with his party who continue to belittle teachers on every education bill they attempt to pass. It is time for more than lip service Mr. Goolsby. It is time for the focus to be on our children, not on the bottom line is or what company "may" or may not locate here because of your attempts to legislate education.

If you want to show us you support education and educators in our state, more so in NHC, it's time for you to stand up and lead.

On the star news website, in the article on this topic, Curtis Wright left harsh comments criticizing teachers as professionals. He made one huge inaccuracy about the state writing assessments that I would like to correct. As I do not have a facebook account, I can't comment there. However, if he is going to mistake a huge, obvious and public piece of information such as this, it makes you wonder what else he is intentionally missing or mixing up. He claimed that the state writing exam does not assess spelling, punctuation or grammar, and cites volunteer judges as his source. Perhaps he should check the validity of this source, as there are actually two rubrics that assess student writing on the state exams: one for content and one for conventions. The conventions cover grammar and mechanics. Both grades are factored into the overall score. These are publicly available on the NCDPI website. All you -or anyone- has to do is look.
Will you blame your lack of fact-checking on your teachers, Mr. Wright?